Guest Post with Allen Michael: 3 Tips to Fast Track Your IVF Savings Plan

I have the distinct pleasure of hosting a guest blogger today. Allen of TheStickVacuums.com has written quite possibly the most comprehensive list of money-saving ideas I have ever seen. And I've read a lot of frugal blog posts! He's here today to share some of the ways he and his wife saved for IVF treatment, but these items and the other on his full list are great ideas for ANYbody looking to reduce expenses and save toward a specific goal or just a more comfortable financial future. Thanks for sharing, Allen!

Always,
Katie

Aside from the emotional and physical toll that the IVF process can take, it is also very financially burdensome. More and more, health insurances are not covering any infertility-related procedures, and this includes the various artificial insemination processes.

For my family, once we determined that IVF was our next step in order to have children, we sat down to look at the finances of the process. And, we realized we were going to face a five-figure bill. The next steps for us were to put together a detailed plan and budget so that we could afford the process.

Several years later, I’m happy to report that we have a beautiful little girl, and were able to pay for the IVF process without going into debt. The entire process for how we saved money every month is outlined, but here are a few specific examples to get you started.

Budget

It sounds obvious, but you need a budget. Not just a general budget either – you need a very detailed budget. It is hard to sit down and put together a detailed budget, but it will serve as your guide through the entire process.


Setting a budget doesn’t mean you need to cut every single thing out of your life, but it does mean you need to plan and allocate for every expense. Knowing where your money is going means that you can begin to control it.

We used an app called Every Dollar to set up our budget. There is a free and paid version, and we opted for the paid version because it automatically synced with our bank account.


Almost immediately, we noticed areas we were wasting money. It was amazing (and shocking), and this is where the rubber meets the road… you’ve got to do something about what you discover. Cut out the areas of waste, and you’ll be saving money for IVF much quicker than you thought possible.

Coupons, Rebates, and Earning Programs

One area we saved and earned money in was through a combination of coupon clipping, using rebates, and participating in several earnings programs.


It is amazing how much money you can save every week by using coupons. We would plan our weekly meals based on what was on sale. This actually had several benefits. Not only did we save a lot of money (chicken on sale for $0.79/pound!), but we had variety in our meals every week.


We also realized there are a lot of rebates available, ranging from energy to water to appliances. Starting looking for rebates you can take advantage of, and then make sure to look into them before making any future purchases.

Lastly, we joined Ebates (<- Katie's husband's affiliate link. Join through our link, earn $10 when you qualify! We'll get a perk, too.) and started getting paid for all of the shopping we were already doing.

Expenses

This is a broad category, but it was probably the single biggest area that we paid for IVF with. I mentioned earlier how we cut out random expenses through our budgeting, but it didn’t stop there. We changed our entire perspective on how we spend money.


It’s funny how setting a goal can invigorate your mindset. For us, setting our goal and then seeing how small changes had big results lit a fire under us. The result was a changed mindset, one that focused on cutting expenses at every turn.


We didn’t just clean up our budget – we changed the entire way we spent money. We stopped going out to eat, and instead opted to cook at home every night… and we enjoyed it. We stopped buying new things, and only bought used… and we enjoyed the game of finding the product. We set up a home gym, got rid of the gym membership, and worked out more frequently as a result.


For me, this speaks to the mindset of saving. My wife and I wanted a child very badly, and we used that to focus our efforts and motivate us to sacrifice. In the end, it almost became a game.

Conclusion

When I saw how much IVF was going to cost us, I almost felt like it was too much to overcome. When we started saving for IVF, we realized that we needed a detailed plan to make it work. In the end, we accomplished our goal a lot sooner than we thought, mainly because we had a dramatic mindset shift. For us, the result was not just a successful IVF campaign, but we now have a financial mindset that will serve our family for decades to come.

Allen Michael is the founder and editor of The Stick Vacuums, a website focused on helping others keep a clean home as efficiently as possible. Allen stumbled onto stick vacuums while trying to help his family keep their home clean with less work, and has since become an expert on saving money and time in your home.